The late grandfather of Captain Brian Thomas told him in a dream that it wasn't his 'time to go'

A sea captain who survived devastating brain injury says he came back from the brink after a near-death experience.

Captain Brian Thomas smashed the left side of his skull when he collapsed after suffering multiple brain bleeds out of the blue while out running.

Two doctors saw him lying on the country lane near his home in Porthgain, Pembrokeshire, and he was rushed to hospital where neurosurgeons battled to save him.

As the Merchant Navy seaman lay in a coma on life support for four weeks at the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, his family were warned he might never walk or speak again and could remain in a vegetative state.

But three months later, after surgeon John Martin rebuilt his skull with titanium, Capt Thomas was home.

Six months later the father of three had returned to his job as an expert mariner and within a year he ran the Cardiff Half Marathon in aid of head injury charity Headway.

Approaching the third anniversary of the fall in July 2011, the seaman, 45, now captains a Stena Line ship sailing from Holyhead to Dublin after passing rigorous military and Merchant Navy medicals with flying colours.

“The sea is home to me. I’m so glad to be back at sea,” he said.

“I think my recovery was determination and strength. I didn’t want to be in bed.”

He remembers his late grandfather speaking to him in his coma, telling him it was not his time to go.

“It was like a dream. I was in a yellow padded cell and knew I was never going to see my family or home again. I was very upset.

“I started pleading for my life and all of a sudden I was on a Western-style train lying in a wagon when a conductor came along. He looked familiar, like my grandfather.

“I was looking for my ticket from Brownsville Texas to Tampico, Mexico, it was very specific and I have been to those places. I couldn’t find my ticket and my grandfather’s voice said, 'Brian, it’s not your time'. From that moment I believe I started to recover.”

Not long afterwards Capt Thomas, who is writing a book about the experience, woke in his ward at the University Hospital of Wales Cardiff to see his parents and sister Yvonne by his bedside.

“Doctors said I might be paralysed, lose my memory, be unable to talk, or be in a wheelchair. They said it would take at least five years to go home. But I’m a determined man.

“I remember waking up with my mother Ann and father Grenville and sister Yvonne all there. I couldn’t talk so I spelled out words from a sheet of letters.”

The former commissioned Royal Navy Officer, who has worked on ships including the QE2, was told his brain bleeds may have been caused by a rugby injury 10 years earlier.

“I got stamped on the head playing rugby and fell at home and knocked my head by no-one can prove that’s what caused it. We just don’t know.”

The near-death experience has changed him, says Capt Thomas, now a chorister at Llanrhian Church, Porthgain.

“My whole view of the world has changed. I understand the good and the bad and I’m more patient and tolerant.

“I believe you’re looked after in some way when you die. Whether you live or die, all will be well. I was told by my surgeon my injuries were enough to kill any man but I believe it wasn’t my time to go.”

Friend the Very Reverend Richard Kilgour, Provost of St Andrew’s Cathedral Aberdeen, where Capt Thomas worshipped while living in the city between 2012 and earlier this year, said: “He has recovered beyond all expectation. Something greater than all of us seems to have made an impact on his life.”

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